About FF

EMOTIONAL THINKERSWe are emotional thinkers and believe in connecting with emotions at the deepest level. In a world more and more ruled by the logic of algorithms and robots, the intelligence of the heart becomes more rare (and even more important). We believe humans are a magical accumulation of energy and when the mind and emotions are aligned in harmony, the heart brings us to our center and helps us create.

CREATIVE LEADERSOur two founders and CEO (Fred & Farid) are multi-awarded creatives who have worked around the world And all our community leaders are creative minds. Creativity is in our core DNA, it is our essence, and our reason to be.

FROM EAST TO WESTWe have built our network from East to West (from China to America), and not the other way around like most agencies.

100% ORGANICWe are 100% organic. This means no acquisitions to artificially boost our network, no cattle call/headhunter casting sessions. Every community was built organically and deliberately. Our founders have opened each office themselves, moving their whole family life each time, to make sure to implement our culture.

BLENDEDWe are a unique combination of Chinese opportunism and fast digital thinking + American obsession for strategy and organization + French sense of craft and culture.

BOUTIQUE NETWORKWe are small and we want to stay that way. We are proud to be a creative boutique network. To us, it means human scale, creative control, sense of craft and passion for client service. We grow by opening new communities, and we keep each one at a human scale to preserve our culture.

DIVERSEDiversity is not just a trendy word to look proper or politically correct. It’s real and since the beginning. It’s in our company DNA (Fred & Farid), it has always been a priority in our recruiting, and in our lives.

HUMANWe believe in human power, human creativity, human positivity, human energy, human emotions, human intuitions, human genius. We are a human company. We believe in building real places with real people. We think that when you bring exciting people in one place without walls or boundaries, the most beautiful things can happen.

BIGWe think big. We believe it’s better to do one big thing than a hundred small things. In such a crowded industry. Your idea will never be big enough to stand out. We work hard on being ambitious at every stage (brief comprehension, data analysis, business intelligence orientation, strategy, ideation, production, launch).

RADICALLY HONESTWe are radically honest. We believe that the best way to help our clients and to nurture our relationship is to honestly (but respectfully) share what we believe to be the right thing to do for the brand.

AESTHETESWe have a genuine passion for the craft. We are aesthetes. We revere taste and culture. We believe in the power of beauty. We apply luxury standards on every piece of communication.

ITERATIVEWe believe in quantity. It’s never the first idea. Re-thinking and “de-thinking” are critical elements of excellence. No-sweat, no glory. We value the sense of effort. Creativity is a muscle, requiring intense daily training.

BUSINESS MINDEDWe believe in business intelligence ideas that create growth. A good strategy with the right creative is not enough. We know that these take all forms, sometimes not communication or marketing. Sometimes it is a product. Sometimes it is in inventing a new form.

MEANINGFULWe try to do meaningful communication when the brief allows. In a world of fear, fast culture, ultra consumption, we believe people are craving for meaning. A campaign touches people’s hearts when we dare to approach a broader topic behind the ad. This approach helps us strike, but also brings meaning to our job.

NAIVEWe are not cynical. Unlike many networks in our industry, we believe in the power of naivete. When hiring, we look for people who are alive, open, real, curious, joyful, smiley, cheeky, amusing, fast, spontaneous, energetic, enthusiastic, passionate, brilliant, independent, intuitive, courageous, fearless, resilient, vulnerable, honest, conscious, sensitive, tasteful, spiritual.

UNITEDWe are one. We are located in four cities, but we are one company. We have a truly international culture. We are mobile; we are curious travelers and highly connected. Our clients benefit from dream teams composed of our best talents worldwide, and our teams get to pick from a range of excellent opportunities from around the world. We highly support internal people turnover within our network.

COMMUNITIESWe don’t believe in the usual hub+satellites structure. Most of the networks have one performing office and weak satellites. We work hard to make each one of our communities performant creatively and in business. Each one of them has the same influential power within our organization.

RADICAL LISTENERSWe are radical listeners. We don’t apply any method or formula on brands. We don’t have any agency style. Self-consciousness is bad for creativity. We have no philosophy, no color (black and white), no sign or animal, no cool font (but Arial, the default font on any computer). We adapt each time to each genre, tailor-made. We are media agnostic, driven only by the idea and the brand. We are chameleon. We are liquid.

TRANSFORMATIVEWe are a transformative company. Everyone who worked at FF can testify that joining our creative community is a transformative experience. Spending a few years with us will make you more creative, more independent, more confident, more ambitious. It will change your career, and perhaps your life.

TACTICSAs a company, we don’t have any war strategy or world-domination masterplan. We are human and emotional. We listen to our instincts and intuitions. But we are good listeners. We seize observed opportunities and adapt very quickly.

GOODWe try to be good people. We do our best to emotionally engage with our employees, and help them grow within our organization. We spend time to understand the nuances of personalities and help hone the skills to make them blossom. It’s selfish in a way; we love to be surrounded by happy and fulfilled people.

PROCESSESWe believe processes help in building culture, even creative culture. On Mondays we do creative reviews and business reviews all day with our 4 communities (LA, NY, Paris, Shanghai). On Wednesdays, each community organizes a creative breakfast to share our work and creative culture based on our website. On Fridays each community organizes a gathering with creative minds from other industries over drinks.

IMPERFECTIONWe don’t believe in perfection in this fast paced changing world. We aim for perfection, but in a realistic, pragmatic way. In a way we apply the digital thinking in real life. Each time we take a decision, we just launch it as soon as possible, to observe the reactions in the real world. Then we adapt, pivot… and edit with humility and speed. Everything at ff is in movement, everything is a work-in-progress, including this chapter about imperfection.

Latest News

100 years after WW1, the French Historial of the Great War presents: the Unknown Face.

A project by FF Paris, a creative boutique agency founded by Fred & Farid

November 11, 1920. In the aftermath of the First World War, for both Paris and London, the burial of an Unknown Soldier embodied the memory of all deceased soldiers. Anonymity guaranteed everyone's heroism and allowed families to grieve.

To mark the Centenary of the Armistice, the Historial of the Great War of Péronne and the creative boutique agency FF Paris are bringing to life a collaborative digital project entitled "Le Visage Inconnu" (The Unknown Face). Regardless of their nationalities or origins, millions of human beings involved in the conflict, both men and women were victims of the horrors of the First World War. In memory of the lives shattered by war, tens of thousands of portraits were collected over several months and overlaid using an algorithm, to make up one unique face: "THE UNKNOWN FACE", human, universal.

This portrait will be unveiled on November 11 at the Historial de la Grande Guerre in Péronne, for the centenary of the Armistice, in the form of a digital work of art. Visitors will be able to browse through the tens of thousands of faces that constitute it.

As of November 8, to extend the experience and share the message of peace that it embodies with the general public, a dedicated interactive platform (produced by Merci Michel studio) www.theunknownface.com will allow you to discover "THE UNKNOWN FACE" and some of the destinies of the men and women who marked the history of the Great War. The site aims to consolidate collective and individual memory contributions. It will be continuously updated with new portraits, modifying, following the morphing technique, The Unknown Face. The experience will also be extended to a dedicated Instagram account to discover faces, story formats and videos on Facebook.

100 years after the Armistice, "THE UNKNOWN FACE" reveals a portrait that symbolizes peace, a synthesis of faces that are now unknown, but were at the time very intimate. This project, approved by the Centenary Mission, is inscribed as a part of the process of remembering, understanding and hope. It carries a universal message of peace with the synthesis of a multitude of faces, of lives carried away in the whirlwind of the Great War.

Nearly 10 months of work were necessary to bring this ambitious project to life, combining technology and the duty of memory in the service of peace. The algorithm specially developed for the purpose of creating faithful face synthesis will allow this face to evolve over time according to the portraits that will continue to be collected from the archives.